


Steadfast Belief

by Zodiac



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Post-Pacifist Route, Reset-aware Papyrus, Starts out with Flowey being a dick then angst then kinda fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-23
Updated: 2015-12-23
Packaged: 2018-05-08 10:11:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5493470
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zodiac/pseuds/Zodiac
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the barrier broke, Flowey finds it difficult to grow accustomed to life on the surface, particularly when he has someone as bright and cheery as Papyrus bothering him all the time with his ceaseless optimism. However, that same optimism may just be the key to making Flowey's new life even a tiny bit less difficult.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Steadfast Belief

**Author's Note:**

> So this fic was done for the [Undertale Secret Santa](http://undertalesecretsanta.tumblr.com/) over on Tumblr. I was assigned to [crashorpie](http://crashorpie.tumblr.com/) who wanted an interaction between Papyrus and Flowey and, since I was really digging the idea of reset-aware Papyrus at the time, I incorporated that into it too.

The days and weeks following the fall of the barrier were a whirl of activity for monsterkind and human alike. Suddenly, younger monsters had discovered a whole new world had opened up for them to explore and the older ones were now finally able to traverse the world they had lived in decades ago. Meanwhile, humans suddenly had a tidal wave of monsters to grow accustomed to in their daily lives.

Members of both sides needed time and effort in order to acclimate to the new conditions, but the one person who was having the most difficulty getting used to all of this technically belonged to neither party.

After everything that occurred beneath the surface, Frisk had outright refused to leave Flowey the flower behind despite knowing that he had tried—and succeeded on several occasions—to eliminate every monster in the underground, whether by himself or by trying to persuade Frisk to do it. So, as gently as they could, they uprooted Flowey to transfer him into a flower pot and dragged him, huffing and wriggling, up to the surface to join all of the monsters.

Luckily for him, pretty much all of the monsters didn’t seem to remember the whole, “Stealing souls in order to reset the world” thing, so it was a relief to know that he wouldn’t have angry monsters yelling at him about that. Many of them seemed accepting of him, though of course they didn’t know who he was; he hadn’t bothered really getting close to anyone during this cycle, after all. However, there was one particular monster who not only greeted him with an eager smile, but open arms as well.

Papyrus.

He was one of the few monsters he decided to actually speak to during this cycle and that was under the guise of becoming his friend so he could use the skeleton to lure everyone else in to his little trap he had set when he acquired the six human souls. So, of course, Papyrus greeted him like the friend that he supposedly was to him, picking up his pot and twirling around with him while shouting cheerful things with his usual vigor and verve, much to the flower’s distress about possibly being dropped.

After that, it was practically impossible for Flowey to convince Papyrus to leave him alone when he was in the skeleton’s presence, which tended to be often considering Frisk insisted upon plenty of outings with all of the friends they had made underground.

It was annoying, aggravating, absolutely _infuriating_! Couldn’t the skeleton tell that he would much rather be left alone than listen to his inane blathering on about noodles or puzzles or any of the myriad of other equally-boring topics he always brought up?! Apparently not, considering that he continued to engage him in chatter that he was _literally_ unable to care about! He couldn’t even tell him off about it either since Frisk always gave him a stern talking-to whenever he was particularly aggressive towards other monsters and that was even more unbearable than suffering through Papyrus’ speeches. So, he reluctantly just put up with his blabbering, doing his best to block out a much of his loud speech as he could.

Which was exactly what he was doing the day that Frisk dragged them all out on a picnic.

Flowey couldn’t eat the actual food that they brought on account of the whole, “Being a flower” thing, but Frisk figured that the extra sunlight might _brighten_ up his mood, (Ugh, they’d clearly been spending too much time around Toriel and that smiley trashbag of a brother Papyrus had.) so they brought him along too. After everyone who could eat had finished doing so, most of the group had left to go play some human sport or some such thing. He couldn’t care enough to pay attention to just what they were planning on doing.

What he _did_ care about, however, was the fact that he had been left behind with Papyrus, who was now talking the flower’s nonexistent ears off.

The subject of the conversation drifted right over his head as he was focused on counting the blades of grass around them, finding shapes in the clouds slowly passing above, zoning out into space, just anything to keep him from having to pay attention to the skeleton’s chattering. In fact, Papyrus’ next words probably would have done the same had he not said them in an uncharacteristically quiet voice.

“…I am glad that things turned out alright this time around.”

The flower slowly turned to face him as well as he could, trying to make sure that he heard him correctly. _This time around_? He spoke that as though he had experienced far too many lifetimes already, all of them less desirable than this one he was living through right now. But no, that was _impossible_. Only his smiley trashbag of a brother remembered the resets and Sans did his best to annihilate him whenever possible as soon as he found out that he was behind them before the human dropped down into the underground. There was _no_ way that Papyrus could have stayed as innocent and naïve as he was if he was also aware of the resets. So, to test the waters, Flowey responded with a simple, “…What do you mean by that?”

The skeleton shifted to face him more fully, a gloved hand idly drifting up to the red scarf he always seemed to have tucked around his neck no matter his outfit or the weather. “Do you… not remember the last time? Or…” His eyes lowered, suddenly finding the ground more interesting than the potted flower. “Did the human kill you even before me?”

 _Oh_. Well, that definitely answered his question. The last cycle, the human had decided to kill rather than spare, slaughtering their way through the underground with him goading them on… up until they reached New Home. At that point, their behavior frightened even _him_ and he fled ahead to the King, the one spot they hadn’t yet reached. Luckily, between New Home and the throne room, the human decided to trigger a reset, wiping the evidence of their sins from the minds of most of the monsters except for a few exceptions: Sans, Flowey, and, apparently, Papyrus. There was no sense in lying to him, not here, not now, so Flowey responded truthfully for once. “No. They didn’t… they didn’t kill me last time.”

“Nyeh heh heh…” There was no humor to the laughter that was usually so booming and jovial. “I am glad for that as well.”

“…But, why?” The sense that Papyrus was making was bordering on that of Frisk’s illogical need to _spare_ everyone, no matter what heinous acts they had committed in the past. If he remembered the resets, then surely he remembered the ones that occurred before the human dropped down, the resets that _he_ caused… The ones where he had gone around slaughtering everyone he could after countless cycles spent befriending them. “Do you not remember what happened before Frisk fell down?”

“Oh, I do. I remember my very first meeting with you. I remember slowly befriending you with my brother. I remember… what happened in cycles beyond that.” He raised a hand to his skull, tapping on it lightly with a gloved finger. “I remember it all.”

“…You haven’t answered why. If you remembered all that, all the terrible things that I’ve ever done to you and to everyone else, then why… Why are you still being so nice to me?”

At that, Papyrus drew his knees up to his chest and let out a heavy sigh as he lightly tucked his arms around them. “The same thing that keeps me being nice to the human even after the last cycle—Belief. Belief that under all the hatred and ugliness on the surface, there’s even the slightest glimmer of good trapped within even the very worst people. And, well, if that glimmer exists, then it can be brought to the surface to show the world how good that person can really be. It may take years or decades or… even countless resets to make that happen, but I _believe_ it can happen for everyone, so there is no point in killing someone when you could simply show them the good in them instead…” His ever-present smile curled up at the edges, turning into one of his signature grins. “After all, Frisk is good this time around and you haven’t tried to attack anyone since we came up to the surface, so if both of you can turn over new leaves, then there’s no stopping anyone else from doing the same, right?!”

For a moment, the flower simply blinked at him. Within him, he felt _something_ , a phantom emotion that didn’t belong to him. That belief that Papyrus was talking about, faded and flickering, but still _there_. It must have been a residual memory left over from when he had absorbed the souls of all the monsters. It wasn’t _quite_ the empathy he so craved, but something close.

And, after spending so long with no empathy whatsoever, close was good enough for him.

Finally, Flowey nodded in agreement to the skeleton’s words. “R-right.”

“Good!” Papyrus was rapidly returning to his usual loud method of speech as he stretched his legs back out. Lifting up the pot containing his floral friend, he practically bounced up to his feet, seemingly having all of his normal perkiness again. “Now, enough talking about resets! The past is the past and now we have a bright, shining new future up on the surface to look forward to and I _believe_ that it will turn out great! And, if the Great Papyrus believes something, then it’s bound to come true! Now, come on, we have friends to spend time with in order to make that belief a reality!”

Silently, the flower nodded again as he was dragged along to join the others who had accompanied them on their picnic, for once not dreading interacting with people he couldn’t bring himself to care about. If he believed like Papyrus did, well, maybe his own happy ending might become a reality too someday.

**Author's Note:**

> If you enjoyed this and wanted to screech at me in a manner similar to socializing, then you can find my Tumblr right [here](http://catsandcomposers.tumblr.com/).


End file.
